Colorful Ambitions
RR Star's breeder and owner, Rose Lundin, Del Norte, Colo., knows a lot about producing equine stars. Her father, and later, the pair together, worked as high-profile movie wranglers, supplying horses for TV shows such as Dallas, Fantasy Island and Gunsmoke, and movies such as Wyatt Earp, City Slickers II and All the Pretty Horses. With up to 450 horses spread between their Colorado and Los Angeles, Calif., facilities, the Lundins had horses to meet the most fickle and demanding producer, director or actor. Rose continues to manage what her father started, expanding into commercials, music videos and other on-screen opportunities.

Horses aren't only part of Rose's profession, but they've also always been her hobby.

"Our first ranch had herds of horses of all breeds," she recalls. "My dad went out one year and brought in horses of color. At that time, I'd been going to horse shows. I was showing reining and gaming horses at age 9."

Rose remembers watching the ranch hands retrieve the horses from the field and noticed that the hands all rode stock horses.

"The horses sure turned fast and handled the stock well. The riders stayed out of their horses' ways and let them work. I really admired that," she says.

Working horses, and later, reiners, became the crown jewels of Rose's farmâthe finery that distinguished them from the rest of the movie-set horses.

As years passed, Rose contemplated selecting the right stallion for her sorrel Quarter Horse mare, RL Miss Kitty. Under the guidance of respected cow-horse trainer Ted Robinson, the mare performed respectably in working cow-horse competition, but not on the national level to which Rose aspired. RL Miss Kitty reached her performance pinnacle by winning the 1996 National Reined Cow Horse Association Novice Horse Championship.

Rose thought hard about the plethora of stallions available. Although her mare was experienced in cow work, Rose really wanted a reining horse â one that'd win the prestigious National Reining Horse Association Futurity in Oklahoma City. Her goal had one minor twist: The horse she'd breed to win the futurity also would have a splash of color.

Read the rest of this feature in the November 2004 issue of Western Horseman magazine. Subscribe by calling 800-877-5278, or click on the "subscribe" link at the top left of this page.